For about two minutes and thirty seconds, I pace in front of the Fat Lady. He's never going to come, I think. I decide to take a walk. I see students milling about the school. A couple of fourth years are sitting around playing Exploding Snap (not the stripping version thank God). I also see Black, and the Slytherin with a magical measuring tape, a box, a roll of parchment, and what seems to be a map. Oddly, Potter is not among them.

"If we place one here.." One of them says. Place one what? OH NO! The dungbombs! I run away as fast as I can.

I find myself in the corridor outside Professor Dumbledore's office. All of a sudden the gargoyle springs to life, and out walk Potter, his mother, and the Headmaster. They seem to be talking chummily together, which is something of a surprise. Potter says something I can't hear, but it must be a goodbye, because he kisses his mother on the cheek, and shakes the Headmaster's hand. Professor Dumbledore and Mrs. Potter continue to talk, while Potter walks toward me. I begin to walk back to the common room slowly, when I remember the only reason I'm where I am is because I am checking to see whether Potter is returning to the common room. I entertain not telling them, but since I am a girl of my word, or rather, Lily's word, I sprint to the common room.

"Wildenbog!"

The group of girls is sitting around their makeup and magazines. Betty is putting the last finishing touches on Winnie.

"He. just. left. the. head. master's." I pant. They all shriek. I plug my ears. Paulette quickly shoves all the makeup and Witch Weekly in the bag and dashes upstairs. Everyone else grabs some chairs and lines them up in a straight row, making one for Paulette too. I shake my head and go back to sit with Lily who is reading.

"Where were we?"

"Number seven, I think."

We settle back into our comfortable pattern. After a few minutes Potter does walk in. The whole common room is silent. Not interested, I keep my head down and continue working.

A voice behind me says, "Lily? May I have a private word?" It's Potter.

"Whatever you want to say, Potter, you can say it in front of me," I tell him.

Potter gives me a look. Then he stands there, silent, for a few seconds, but doesn't leave. He swallows, and looks Lily straight in the eye. "I-I- I'd like to know if you would like to go to the Noel Night with me," he blurts out.

WHAT? POTTER is asking LILY to the NOEL NIGHT? Where did this come from? Potter has been meaning to ask Lily the whole time? Lily's the girl he really likes? There's something really weird here. I can't believe it. Not a word.

I'm not the only one who is shocked. The common room is completely still. All the girls who spent all that time preparing look murderous. Lily has a pleasantly surprised look on her face.

Potter is red in the face, something I'd never seen before from the boy has no shame. "I'd understand if you said no, but I just thought I'd ask. We've worked together a lot and it would be fun to." Lily looks at me, confused. I think she wants me to tell her whether she should say yes or no.

It isn't my decision to make. I can't stand him, I can't stand Black, I can't stand Lupin, and I especially hate that Slytherin who is in our common room right now. For the past six and a half years, I've made this all quite clear. But it is sweet that Potter asked her, and he did do it nicely.

I look at Potter; he seems really nervous. His face is really red now. Far out. He must like Lily. Lily herself seems excited. I think she does want to go with Potter.

Lily is still looking at me for advice. There's nothing else for it. I shrug at her and nod my head.

"Yes, I will," Lily says with a small smile.

Potter breathes a great sigh. "This is- this is...great." He seem a bit awkward standing there, so he goes off to join his friends who are all back in the common room after their dungbomb planting. He smiles at Lily, and he and his friends head off to their dormitory. Probably to figure out where would be a good place to plant another dungbomb.

The whole common room begins to react to what has happened. All the girls are really cross.

"Potter wants to go with Evans? I thought they hate each other!"

"She isn't even wearing makeup! She's not even nice to him. She doesn't deserve him at all."

"Lily's a prefect. She should know love potions are illegal. And if she doesn't, it's a miracle her snot-nosed friend didn't tell her."

"Let's go, Lily," I say. We are out of there as I hear someone say, "I wonder how much she is paying him."

We go into our dormitory. I sit on the bed. "That was strange."

"What do you mean?" Lily asks me.

"I never expected Potter to ask you to the dance." I tell her. "It was nice of him. Should I have said 'no?'" She looks at me strangely.

"DO you really want to go to dance with Potter?" I ask.

"I.well. actually- I do. James has been really nice to me. I like working with him. He likes working with me. It should be rather enjoyable." She notices the blank look on my face. "Oh come on, Ros, I do like him. I know you don't, but please.."

"It seems so strange. him asking you and all. Does he really care? Maybe he wants to make a fool of you or something heinous like that," I muse.

"I know you hate him, but James isn't that type of person. He likes to play jokes, but they're always from the Zonko's genre." Lily insists. "He never tries to hurt anyone or be mean. It's mischief, not malice"

"What about the time when Snape came up to breakfast wearing makeup and a hair bow because he doesn't look at himself in the morning during our fourth year? Everyone laughed at him, and he was badly humiliated. It was really cruel, and rather malicious. Who did that? It certainly wasn't Evan Rosier," I say.

"Maybe James didn't do it. Perhaps it was Black." Lily suggests.

"Oh, I don't KNOW! Just be careful, for my sake?" I fall onto my bed, and pound my fists into the pillow.

Lily gets up to storm out of the dormitory. She stops in the doorway, aware of what is downstairs. Face red, I grab my cloak and get up and go instead.

"Thanks," she calls after me.

* * *

The girls are still jeering in the common room. It's so immature, I think to myself. There's nothing for me to do, so I go to the library.

The Hogwarts Library is an immense place. It's got one of the best private magical book collections in the world. But the one thing Hogwarts is lacking is fiction. Good, solid magical fiction. Action-adventure novels, mysteries, historical books, humor, horror, and just plain yarns. Appropriate, really, considering that it is an academic library that contains volumes on the most complicated magical theories in the world. There is one small collection of books, started in the nineteenth century by a headmistress who liked that sort of thing. She wanted to have a huge collection, but she died a year after being elected headmistress, and the new headmistress didn't approve of spending library funds for books unrelated to studies. The library never bothered to withdraw them. There's only about one hundred, so I've read all the good ones, but I always check to see if there is an interesting one that I haven't read. There never is. A volume that I've seen a million times, but always glossed over, catches my eye. "Requited Love" is the title. I hate romance novels. They really are trash.

The headmistress who bought all the books handwrote a summary for each of them on a little parchment card placed inside the books. I take a peak at the summary.

"Devious Pollyanne Winston is madly in love with the dashing Gregor Uxbridge, but every bit of conversation they have had has been cold, and unromantic. She dreams of becoming closer to her love, but with every exchanged word, their relationship breaks further. Her family thinks Gregor is worthless, but to Pollyanne, he is nothing but the deepest desire of her heart. "Unbeknownst to Pollyanne, Gregor feels likewise. He admires her every sentiment, and she means more to him than the deepest magic. He has a reputation as a rogue, and he cannot find the words to express his emotions. "Both decide to brew up a powerful love potion, but neither realizes the potion does not work. Each thinking he or she has successfully wooed the other, they let all guard down until they realize both have been acting out of their own hearts, and destiny follows its due course. "An enchanting tale. Sure to please the young and the lovers. One of the Daily Prophet's top ten books for witches "

I go over to a table and begin reading. It's not as bad as I thought it would be. Trash novels, as disgusting as they are, apparently never fail to engross. While I am reading I pull my figure of Renée Flamboyer out of my pocket, and put her on the table to walk around. I got her at the Quidditch World Cup that took place years before I came to school. We don't usually waste our money on souvenirs, but my dad let me get a figure of the French seeker after I had promised that she wouldn't be sitting under my bed after owning her for a week. I didn't let her go for the week after she had caught the snitch and beat West Germany. Even now I still carry her around.

I have to have been there for an hour, reading, in the tables in the back. I begin to enjoy the book, and all my tense feelings seem to go away. Reading is one of the most useful emotion breakers, that's why I love it so much.

Unfortunately it doesn't work. I look up from my book to see Veronica Engerton staring at me.

"What do you want?" I ask her.

"I just came to tell you I think you are a bitch. I don't what HE sees in you. I'm going to make you miserable for what you did."

"WHAT?" "Don't play dumb. I don't know how you did it, but you STOLE him from me. If it wasn't for you, I'd still have my date," Veronica shrieks.

Wait a second. What did I do? Steal her date? Potter? But Potter's going with Lily, not me.

My God! Veronica thinks that I am the one who is going to the dance with Potter. For someone who's already part mental, that's impressive, not getting the right person. I begin to fasten my cloak. When I look down to latch the silver fastenings, I see that the badge on my chest isn't my own. Intead of a "P", it says "HG" on it. Head Girl. I have Lily's cloak. Veronica must have heard Potter asked the Head Girl, and saw my badge. Pretty moronic not to know whom the Head Girl is, even if someone else is wearing the badge.

I start laughing.

"So, you aren't sorry, are you? You are a bitch, I'm going to make you sorry. Starting now." She reaches for my minute Renée, who is looking up at Veronica, hands on hips.

I grab at Renée, but Veronica is too fast. "You can't do that!"

Madam Pince, the librarian, rushes over. "What is this nonsense?"

Veronica may be thick, but she is rather swift when it comes to being rotten. "I'm just taking back what she stole."

"That-I-Hey!" Veronica is gone. Madam Pince gives me a dirty look that makes my insides shudder. I spent seven years getting that woman to like me, and thanks to Engerton, it's all gone down the loo.

'I'd like to check this out," I say softly. Madam Pince rips the book from my hands and swoops over to her desk to sign out the book. She finishes, and pushes the book wordlessly to the corner of the desk, tutting about good-for-nothing girls, and good-for-nothing books.

I can't believe this.

* * *

I don't even sleep enough to call tonight's slumber a kip. I toss and turn enraged at everyone. Veronica for being mean, a moron, and herself; Potter, for breaking up with her, which made her mad at me, and Lily, because she's so happy. I peaked into her curtains when I came in, and she's got arms around one of her pillows, and this goofy grin on her face. I bet she was dreaming about him.

What kind of right does Veronica think she has to act like that? I do absolutely nothing to her, and she steals one of my favorite possessions, calls me the b-word that I can't stand, and ruins my standing with a teacher, who likes precious few students to begin with? It's all Potter's fault. He probably orchestrated it all, using Lily to make Veronica mad at me to get even for all the times I've turned him and all his friends into McGonagall for rule-breaking. It's just the sort of thing Potter would do. As pointless as his pranks are, they're DEEP. He and Black once got revenge on Snape for making snide remarks about their Slytherin friend's stupid haircut by making all of his hair fall out. It grew back in a day, and as mean as it was, Potter knows a thing or two about poetic justice.

I bet Potter doesn't even have feelings for Lily. Maybe he's just using her for charms answers. He's Head Boy, but he's really rich, and I bet his mum bribed Professor Dumbledore. No, that's not it. I bet he blackmailed him. I know the headmaster is above taking bribes. I bet he really doesn't have the highest grades of all the boys, and he just cheats to get decent marks. I'm goiug to do something tomorrow.

* * *

"Why would James ask me to Noël Night if he didn't like me?" Lily says at breakfast the next morning.

"I don't know. It just seems peculiar," I explain.

"I don't know what's gotten into you, Ros, but it doesn't seem that way to me." She grabs her plate and goes to eat at another place at the Gryffindor table. Much to my dismay, that new place happens to be next to Potter. I realize that I haven't told her about Veronica, so she doesn't know why I'm so cross.

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a/n Ahhh. The end of another chapter. If you are bored, take a peek at some of my other stuff.please? I'd recommend the Ultimate Prequel.